A unique blog dedicated to covering the worlds of book publishing and the news media, revealing creative ideas, practical strategies, interesting stories, and provocative opinions. Along the way, discover savvy but entertaining insights on book marketing, public relations, branding, and advertising from a veteran of two decades in the industry of book publishing publicity and marketing.

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Wednesday, October 7, 2015

Author Speaks Out On Sibling Abuse, Mental Health, & Healing

“It is the first day of
summer, and this is what my days will be like for the next three months. After all, who is going to believe a
twelve-year-old girl put her six-year-old sister into an oven and tried to kill
her?”

This is in the opening pages
of a gripping tale, My Five Sisters, of how one girl, Angela, consumed by
undiagnosed Dissociative Identity Disorder, makes life for her younger sister,
Patra unbearable. It is a story of courage, perseverance, and survival. The
true story dramatizes what happens when sibling abuse at the hands of someone
with multiple personalities goes unchecked.

“Mental illness changed my
loving sister into something that is hard for most people to understand,” says
Franklin, now 68. “Her life was
destroyed, and along with that, she tried to destroy mine. Fortunately, I came out on the other side a
better person, but I know that most people are not so fortunate.

“There is a very dark place
these personalities live within someone else’s body, and until you have
experienced living within the realm of their mind and their world, it’s hard to
understand the horror of their existence.”

Awareness of the disease is
the only way to help people who may not even know they are suffering from
the-illness. It is Franklin’s wish that
after reading her book someone will recognize these traits in someone they love
– and help them.

I have the honor of promoting
Pam and her book to the media. Her message is so important, as it speaks to the
strong will to survive, to heal, and to protect others from having to go
through what she endured. It is so important that parents, grandparents,
teachers, and caregivers recognize the signs of sibling abuse, as opposed to
dismissing misbehavior as mere sibling rivalry. It is also important to help
those who suffer from Dissociative Identity Disorder and to support an increase
in mental health care.

Here is
an interview with Pam:

1.Pam, what inspired
you to write about growing up the victim of sibling abuse at the hands of
someone suffering from Multiple Personality Disorder? I have always
wanted to write this book, but I waited until my middle sister passed away
because it revealed the sexual abuse she endured.

2.How difficult was
it to relive some tough memories from your childhood during the writing of My
Five Sisters? I wrote eight to ten hours a day and finished
the book in three months. It was excruciating. I cried all day every day, but
once I started it I knew I could not stop until it was done.

3.Angela, your
sister, who was six years older than you, had five distinct personalities that
you labeled as Hero, Kind, Normal, Sad, and Angry. How did you begin to recognize and deal with
each of those personalities? I happened over time. Hero came first,
without speaking, she would take my father by the hand, lead him into a room
and close the door. She protected me by taking the sexual abuse away from me.
Angry came next and she was a crazy wild person that beat me, threw me in
closets and made my life a living hell. Sad cut herself, burned herself with
cigarettes and cried most of the time. Kind took care of me after Angry hurt
me, and Normal-Angela didn’t know about the others. It took a long time for me to realize these
were different people, not the same person.

4.By bringing
awareness of mental disease, what do you hope to accomplish? Ten percent of the population take
antidepressants today. There are a lot more that are undiagnosed. I hope my
book helps families and friends recognize someone they know who suffers from
some type of mental disorder and can help them recognize their illness and get
diagnosed and treated.

5.What are the signs
that a child might be suffering some level of physical or emotional abuse at
the hands of a sibling? The book will
tell you children normally don’t tell anyone about what goes on in the home.
That’s one reason I wrote the book. Parents need to be made aware that sibling
rivalry and sibling abuse are two separate things. Bullying outside the home is
newsworthy today. But sibling bullying is ignored by most parents as normal
behavior.

6.What should a
parent do if he or she believes there’s a problem at home? The same thing
you would do if there is bullying in school, don’t give up until you find out
the truth about what is going on. Do not ignore the signs of abuse of any kind.

7.Why didn’t you
tell your mother or anyone else what was happening to you? Most children
don’t. First you are scared of these people, second you don’t think anyone will
believe you, and for some reason you blame yourself. Your confidence and self-
esteem is zero and you are confused about why this is happening to you.

8.Your father was
kicked out of the house when you were very young. Your mother knew he was a drunk, but did she
know he was sexually abusing your siblings? She walked in on my in on father
having sex with my 15 year old sister. She threw him out of the house and
divorced him. She had no idea he was sexually abusing a 5 year old and an 11
year old. It was the fifties and no one really knew anything about sexual abuse
of children.

9.How did you handle
your father during visits? Fear, terror.
He had weekend visitation with us. No one knew he was sexually abusing Angela,
she was eleven. Angela and I did not know why our parents got a divorce. No one
talked about sexual abuse or molestation in the 1950’s.

10.In your book, you
seem to express feelings of love and empathy toward your abusive sister. How did you find a way to separate the good
and bad sides to her?
They were different people. Kind and Hero loved me and I loved them. Angela and
Sad ignored me and I left them alone as much as possible. Angry hated me and I
feared her and tried to stay out of her way.

11.Did she ever get
the help she needed?
No. She married several times, had five children and abused them the same way
she did me. Her children have told me she developed other personalities they
also named and had to learn to deal with.

12.You grew up in the
South in the 1950s. Your family had a
loving maid, Mamie, who witnessed how your sister tried to kill you, but she
too had to remain silent out of fear.
Why?
We are talking about the South in the fifties. “Coloreds People”
were not allowed to say anything about a white person. Mamie knew she could not
talk about what went on in our house to anyone.

13.When you told your
surviving family members you were writing a book about them, how did they
react?
My brother and one sister are still
alive, and they both support me.

14.How did you
forgive your sister and move forward? It
helped that I spent ten years in therapy from age twenty to thirty. Even though
I have lead a very successful life, I am still a work in progress. That’s why I
feel my story could help others. There is hope even when you think there is
none.

15.You started a
business at age 28 and for 18 years you ran a successful daycare for 125 children. Were you able to help children in a way you
wished someone could have helped you as a child? Over the eighteen
years of working with small children I was on the lookout for behavioral
problems and abuse. I think I was hyper-sensitive to children’s needs and I
sent more than one family to therapy. In Jackson we had a counseling service
called The Shepherd’s Staff that helped single parents and low income families
that could not afford to pay full price. They based your fee on your income,
and many families were helped by this service.

16.You got divorced
when your daughter was three. What role,
if any, did your childhood’s household dynamics play in how you raised your
family? I lived in fear my daughter would be abused
either sexually or physically. I think that is why I had only one child. I was
very protective of her, I never left her with a baby sitter or anyone else.

17.Your sister tried
to kill herself and you saved her. But
she tormented and frightened you. Did
you ever just want to see her disappear? I
wanted Angry to disappear, but the other sisters I cared for.

18.How did your mom
never know what was really happening to you?
I was a master at hiding my feelings and the signs of physical abuse. It
was survival for me, I thought she would kill me if I told. Later in life I
didn’t see any reason to hurt my mother by telling her.

19.You finally spoke
up of the abuse you suffered when you were 18 and confided in your church’s
minister. By the age 23 you were helped
by a psychologist. How did they help you
heal? Without therapy I’m not sure what my life
would have been, but I do know I would not be the successful person I am today.
I was far too damaged to function in a normal life. Another reason I would like
to help others that have dealt with any type of severe abuse.

About Me

Brian Feinblum, the creator and author of BookMarketingBuzzBlog, is the chief marketing officer for the nation's largest book promotions firm, Media Connect (www.Media-Connect.com), formerly Planned Television Arts, and has been involved in book publicity and marketing since 1989. He has served several book publishing companies as a publicist, book editor, and acquisitions editor. Brian, who earned a BA in English from Brooklyn College, became a published author in 1995 when he penned The Florida Homeowner, Condo and Co-Op Handbook. He resides in Westchester, New York with his wife, two young children, and an English Bulldog.